We tried to sound the alarm about what harm torture could bring. The Bush administration didn't listen. Had they, we simply wouldn't be here today. If there is any positive to come out of the release of this report, and turmoil that may come as a result of facts being released, let it be, finally, a wake-up call. Let it lead to the American people immediately disqualifying any candidate for president, in 2016, who won't clearly and definitively rule out the use of torture by intelligence or military under their administration. Let it serve as a reminder of our duty to hold our elected officials accountable for what they do, or plan to do, in our name. And let it remind us that the reasons against torture are more than just moral ones. They're quite practical, too.

Unless the administration leaps back through the looking glass to the real world, the next two years will be grim. Chuck Hagel's departure will not change that forecast. And neither will Dr. Carter's nomination allow an escape from Obamaland-- no matter his qualifications.

The review of CIA interrogation methods during George W. Bush's presidency has been the subject of a contentious back-and-forth, with U.S. intelligence agencies and the White House on one side pushing for mass redactions in the name of national security and committee staffers on the other arguing that the proposed redactions render the report unintelligible.

Republicans should be more concerned about the failure of GOP leadership to address this issue. Not only did Boehner miss out on an opportunity to mend fences with a growing Hispanic voting bloc, he has now backed himself into a corner with no clear way out.

Any book released with Bush' name on it is part of a publicity campaign to restore and burnish his image. If you think that's not the case, you're either extremely naive, you haven't watched Olivia Pope do her magic on Scandal -- or both.

The administration appears to have lost its collective mind. The president has added ground forces to the battle in Iraq and the military has suggested introducing thousands more. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel might be lucky having been left at the curb.

November 20 was the 25th anniversary of the adoption by the U.N. General Assembly of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. It may come as a shock to many Americans to learn that the three rogue nations in the world that have refused to ratify this no-brainer convention are Somalia, South Sudan and the United States.

We are living in The Neocon Moment, a testament to the foolishness and arrogance of those who believe themselves to be engineers of peoples, societies, and nations. Yet Washington officials have yet to tire of America's permanent state of war.

Americans have voted for two presidents in a row whose main campaign message was they were going to bring the country together, fix the divisiveness in D.C., and build consensus across the aisle. And in the aftermath of Obama and Bush, the country is coming away more polarized and governance more dysfunctional.

When Congress wouldn't pass a bill, the president had to act on immigration and deportation policy, to keep families intact -- a measure that affected 40 percent of the undocumented immigrants in the United States.